The WDTV media player lets you stream movies, TV shows and music from your home network of computers and hasrd drives in most formats. Connects wirelessly to a broadband connection and can use your smartphone as a remote control using the WD TV Remote app.

Cons

In this review

Quick Verdict

Western Digital is now on its third line of Internet media streamers. The device is very affordable and also easy to set up.

Introduction

Western Digital has been around for some time. It is better known for the hardware it manufactures. But now that Internet television is becoming so popular, Western Digital has decided itís time to leave a mark in the entertainment industry. Its new WD TV Live includes new design and features. This device is very small measuring at just 4.9 inches wide and 1.2 inches high. It is small enough to fit in the palm of your hand so you will have no trouble finding room for it on a crowded entertainment center.

Setup

Set up of WD TV Live is very easy. You only need to plug in the AC adapter provided and connect the HDMI hookup or AV connection to your television. Additionally, audio and video connections are also provided to connect to your television or home theater separately. This may be a better choice if your television does not have HDMI connections. Unfortunately, Dolby sound can only be accessed through HDMI. The next step would be to hook up your Ethernet cable or use the WiFi available. Wireless connections are very easy to use as WD TV Live will have no issues finding your router and Internet access during this procedure. Once this device has been hooked up users will see a menu displayed on the screen. You will then be allowed to choose setup for video purposes.

Performance

Now that WD TV Live has been set up properly, your Internet media will now be available on your television screen. There are no controls on the unit itself but Western Digital does supply users with a remote control that operates similar to most remote controls available. However, if you lose the remote control you will no longer be able to control your device.

There will be many situations where you will need to input text information such as usernames and passwords for logging into online video subscription services. These can be done of in a much easier manor if the user has access to a USB enabled keyboard that can be hooked up to your WD TV Live. In this case, the remote and keyboard can be used interchangeably to navigate the menus provided. Unfortunately, you may experience some difficulties with the menus you will need to navigate for some Internet video subscription services. The menus provide with WD TV Live will be no problem, but the menus of available services must be handled in a different manner. It may not be very easy to navigate the services used with a remote control. Users may find scrolling through menus from Netflix and Hulu to be a little clunky and slow. In fact, in some situations you may be dropped out of browsing entirely. Searching these services can also be difficult, but use of the keyboard will help.

Internet Subscription Services

Once you get past the navigation difficulties, the best features available in the WD TV Live is support provided for Internet-based content. Unfortunately, while some support is not provided users may experience some difficulty with this device while trying to view protected premium content from services such as iTunes, Amazon, Movielink, and Vongo.

Playback Quality

WD TV Live does have some excellent video output quality. Using the HDMI output users can view video at 1080p resolution no matter the quality of the video coming in. Plainly put this device will upscale video output quality from lower resolution sources. For instance, in the case of YouTube where video quality depends on the upload source, this device will provide a much higher viewing resolution. Because of this, we found video playback quality to be one of the bigger selling features of this device.

Verdict

Since high-quality audio and video playback streaming important when viewing Internet subscription video services, WD TV Lives stand out from the crowd. Additionally, this device is extremely compact and very easy to set up. Users will find some difficulty navigating menus the Internet services provided, but that is really not the fault of Western Digital as that is out of their control. For users who do not own smart televisions or network connected TVs, the WD TV Live will make an excellent addition to your home theater system. Since the device is so small there would be no difficulties finding room for it on your entertainment center. Additionally, this device is very affordable with multiple models are available. Since this is not Western Digitalís first Internet media streamer, they have worked through the majority of the bugs that could be found in earlier models. In fact, this is their third version of Internet media streamers they have manufactured. So you can be sure this device is created with quality. The biggest downfall we noticed was the lack of controls available on the unit. If a user ever lost the remote control this device would be rendered completely useless.